Pearl came to me as a 6 y.o. cat my brother had to give up. Older with a gimpy leg, I didn't think she'd have much chance at adoption. I noticed she had a lot of non-productive hairballs. Seemed to throw up after eating, but not throw up food. I took her in for a check up and while the doctor xrayed her for signs of IBD, didn't see that but saw bad arthritis in her knee. Overall, other than that and the coughing (which seemed to go away at times). Then my boy Grant died and within a month of that Pearl had several coughing fits in one day. I took her the ER vet who diagnosed asthma and put her on prednisone. The next day I took the xrays to my regular vets. They felt there was something going on with her heart. We did an ultrasound that afternoon and she was diagnosed with mitral insuffici